way, and I find myself truly grateful for Allie forcing him on me because if Harrods can agree to this, then it’ll be full steam ahead after our meeting on Friday.
When we order coffee and dessert, I find my curiosity about how Santino has changed knocking too hard in my head to ignore. Biting the bullet, I ask, “So, tell me about this two-month chump nickname I hear you have?”
Santino’s dark brows lift as he holds his cup of coffee to his lips. “Sorry?”
I fight back a smile. “I hear you’re some kind of monogamous heartbreaker nowadays.”
Santino shakes his head and rolls his eyes. “Who told you that?”
“Freya via Allie, Allie via Roan, I think?”
“One thing you need to know about the Harris family and all their friends and cousins is that there’s no such thing as a secret. Not that my dating life has anything to hide, but when there’s any bit of gossip offered to someone, everyone will hear about it. And I mean everyone.”
Giggling, I stab my fork into a sweet Modawk dumpling stuffed with nutmeg and saffron. “So, what does it mean exactly?”
“Pretty much what it sounds like.” He sighs heavily. “I can’t seem to make a relationship stick for very long. Some end after a few weeks, some after a couple of months.”
My brows furrow because Santino seems so different and mature now. Going on annual trips with his mother, volunteering to help out Freya and me. This definitely isn’t the same sleazy nightclub lad I met five years ago, but maybe deep down, he’s still a womanizing arsehole who can’t commit. “What’s the problem you think?” I inquire, even though I probably already know the answer.
He shrugs. “Lack of connection, lack of interest, lack of…good sex.” His dark eyes narrow on me, and I feel a flutter in my belly that really needs to go away.
“Sounds…lacking. How many have there been?” I swallow the knot in my throat because I hate that I keep asking more questions. I never cared who he slept with even when we were sleeping with each other, so why do I give a toss now?
“God, I’ve lost count.” He reaches across the table and snags a dumpling off my plate. “At first, I was letting the Harris wives set me up, then I tried to find someone on my own. It’s not for lack of trying, I’ll tell you that.”
“What inspired this sudden change of heart for you?” I ask, watching his square, whiskered jaw as he chews his sweet treat. “Last I knew, you were running away screaming from commitment.”
“Careful now.” He winks. “Don’t want to break one of our non-date rules.”
I roll my eyes. “Are you avoiding the question?”
He gets a serious look in his eye. “No, but I don’t think you’re going to like the answer.”
My stomach falls. “Tell me anyways.”
He sits back in his seat and exhales heavily, a dark look fleeting across his face that he instantly masks. “Part of it was just that I was too old to be going out to clubs with footballers and hooking up with girls who were all trying to shag a Harris Brother. Honestly, it’s pathetic when I look back on it. I should have had my own life by then.” His face grows serious when he adds, “But the real reason had a lot more to do with everything that happened to you.”
“Me?” My skin prickles with anxiety.
He nods slowly, his eyes becoming grave. “There are things about my past that made what happened to you affect me on a deep, dark level.”
“What kinds of things?” I ask, my body leaning into him with curiosity.
His face goes hard, and he shakes his head firmly. “It’s not important, but it is…strangely connected. After you left, I realised that all the things I had been avoiding for my own fucked-up reasons suddenly weren’t all that scary.”
I blink back at him, my mind reeling with that cryptic information. What is he referring to? What about my situation could have possibly triggered something in him? I open my mouth to ask questions, to pry, to challenge and get the full story…but I can’t. Asking deep questions like that would not only break the rules, it would smash them to pieces.
I bite my lip and force my very gentle reply, “Well, I guess there’s one good thing that came out of my situation. Now you’re the perfect single man.”
“Hardly.” His shoulders shake with silent laughter. “Actually, if you want the truth